


My Delirium

by scrapbullet



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Mindfuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-24
Updated: 2011-10-24
Packaged: 2017-10-24 22:40:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/268684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scrapbullet/pseuds/scrapbullet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One world ends, and another one begins.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Delirium

Labour is a frightful thing.

It’s not pleasant, not at all. It’s the expulsion of one life from the warmth and safety of a cocoon, into the harsh light of day and it _hurts_. It hurts like a thousand bee stings and for a moment he can only breathe, let it settle into his bones and ease through him as it passes.

One world ends, and another one begins.

The air is full of ash. It tastes strange on his tongue, and he’s almost baffled that he still has the capacity for such a thing, wandering the grounds with bare feet and tatty old trousers stiff with blood. He tilts his head back, sighs. The wind bites at his face.

It’s cold.

Too cold.

Truthfully, he doesn’t know how far he walks, doesn’t even know how he got here. He walks until the pads of his feet split apart and bleed, until gravel works their way into the open wounds and infects them with a runny yellow pus. He walks because he has to, because there are no voices and the silence is deafening, and he takes to murmuring to himself in umber tones to placate the beating of his heart.

When he sleeps, he dreams.

It is this, and the reverent touch of a man, too tall and full of sharp angles touching him in ways that make his head spin. It is this, and the bruising kiss and the way the veil parts as they sink into one another, hips rocking and hands clasped, mind to mind and the sweetness of a heat that lingers.

It is him, and he _knows_ him, knows the intricate dance of their banter and the quiet intimacy of chess, the maze that is _his_ memories; dead end after dead end after –

 _can’t see, you can’t, never, never, I’ve done too many things, too many things, things you can’t see_ –

and when Charles wakes (for that’s his name, isn’t it? He’d forgotten) he savours the flavour of these memories, and smiles.

They spur him onward.

-

“I’m afraid I don’t quite know who you are,” he says to himself one night, as the chill sets in. He finds shelter in an abandoned house, though only two walls remain, and the clothes he’d stolen from the armoire are as warm as they are large, “you haunt me and it’s quite frustrating.”

He imagines his phantom lover smiles, shark-teeth and sharp eyes, and says nothing.

He always says nothing. It frustrates Charles to no end.

“Oh, I don’t know why I bother. You’re not going to answer me.”

The phantom shakes his head.

Charles huffs, turns over and goes to sleep.

-

Skinning a rabbit is a difficult task, made more so by the thick bandages that decorate his poor, abused digits. The knife slips in his grasp and he curses, smearing fur dappled blood across his hands.

The phantom laughs.

Charles scowls, face like thunder.

“You would laugh, wouldn’t you,” he utters angrily, wiping his hands on his trousers with an air of misplaced dignity. “You’re not the one struggling to feed himself you bloody _arsehole_ -” and the anger bleeds out of him, leaving him feeling oddly empty. He perseveres; must, lest he have no meat to add to his pitiful plate of vegetables (and how strange that only those of a bipedal nature have fallen, but for himself, for he has been quick to note the abundance of wildlife) and in the end he sits back, proud, spitting the carcass on a happily burning fire.

Well. Rather sedately, but it burns nonetheless.

“You need a name,” Charles decides. He uses a piece of bone to pick underneath his fingernails, blood and soil sloughing off onto the blanket he sprawls on.

 _Do I?_ says the phantom.

“Yes.” Is the response, and Charles wracks his brain in an attempt to find something suitable. His lover doesn’t look like a Hank, or an Alexander. Not a Sean, and certainly not an Armando. Sebastian is completely out of the question.

“I have it!” he says finally, gleefully. “Erik!”

The phantom subsides, pleased.

Charles spends the night reading the stars, belly full and content despite his solitude.

-

Things change.

He doesn’t remain alone for long.

-

Her name is Angel, and she’d be quite beautiful if it weren’t for the expression of absolute disgust on her face, like something has crawled under nose and died, rotting sweet and thick. “You have no idea, do you? You’ve really lost your marbles.”

Charles blinks. “Your company is rather unpleasant.”

She sneers, though it makes her look no less attractive. She propels forward, taking flight, and he can’t help but admire the gossamer texture of her wings as she departs, wondering how on earth they serve to hold her weight.

 _Fascinating_.

Erik rumbles beside him, displeased.

 _You’re going to walk straight into the arms of death, one day_.

Rolling his eyes Charles deftly slings his satchel over his shoulder. They have miles to go before they sleep. “Don’t be so dramatic.”

-

Slumber.

 _Have you forgotten your training, Charles?_ Erik asks him, straddles him and rests his palms heavily on his shoulders. _Have you forgotten it all so easily? So quickly?_

Charles hums. Erik smells of warm spices, and it makes him feel soft at the edges. He blinks, overcome. “I don’t know what you’re on about, old boy.”

And Erik sighs, mutters _of course you don’t_ , like Charles is some kind of wayward child.

What’s the point, really? What’s the point of having a lover if he chastises you like you’re an idiot, and Charles huffs, resisting the urge to raise his hand to his temple, sense memory long since passed, and traces Erik’s taut behind with wandering hands. “Hush now. Kiss me.”

Erik does.

-

He doesn’t quite know when _he_ had turned to _they_. And yet, less of plural and more of singular, twins, two halves of a whole.

Ah well. It doesn’t really matter.

They have more important things to ponder on, after all.

-

His feet hurt-

 _of course they do, the wounds are infected you **fool**_

and the sun is beating down on him, utterly determined to strip him of his stolen clothing. Sweat beads down his forehead, stinging his eyes, and the world tilts on its axis; twist and turn and catch and fall. Charles rests his head upon the ground. He’s so tired.

There is the indescribable feeling of something, some _one_ , tugging on the train of his thought. He grimaces, flicking a hand into the air as if to ward off an irritating insect.

“Five minutes. Just five more minutes.”

He closes his eyes.


End file.
